Osborne outlines carbon plans

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The UK will abandon its targets for reducing carbon emissions if other countries fail to meet theirs, chancellor George Osborne has promised. “We’re not going to save the planet by putting our country out of business,” he told an audience of Tory party members in Manchester yesterday, adding that Britain will “cut our carbon emissions no slower but also no faster than our fellow countries in Europe”. An aide to the chancellor said that he has insisted upon a “get-out clause” in EU-wide emissions agreements to that effect. However, Osborne said nothing about whether the UK would continue to cut emissions if the US and China fail to reduce their output.